Thinkers
Launch Anti-Empire Driveby Jim Lobe
October 17, 2003

Representatives
of a new coalition of prominent foreign-policy scholars and analysts
whose political views range from right to centre-left announced here
Thursday they hope to spearhead opposition to the imperial policies
pursued by the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush.

Leaders
of the 'Coalition for
a Realistic Foreign Policy' charged that the administration is moving
"in a dangerous direction toward empire," an idea that they
said has never been embraced by the U.S. public.

The spokespersons
said they will hold a series of policy forums and conferences around
the country, publish papers and articles, and represent an anti-imperial
viewpoint on television and radio, media that, since the Sep. 11, 2001
terrorist attacks on New York and the Pentagon, have been largely dominated
by pro-imperial or pro-war voices.

"We are
a diverse group of scholars and analysts from across the political spectrum
who believe that the move toward empire must be halted immediately,"
says the coalition's charter statement, signed by 44 foreign-policy
specialists.

"We are
united by our desire to turn American national security policy toward
realistic and sustainable measures for protecting U.S. vital interests
in a manner that is consistent with American values," it added.

"The
time for debate is now," the charter states, noting that imperial policies
"can quickly gain momentum, with new interventions begetting new dangers."

Among
the more prominent right-wing signers are Doug Bandow, a special assistant
to former president Ronald Reagan and now a senior officer at the libertarian
Cato Institute, Scott McConnell, chief editor of The American Conservative
magazine and Alan Tonelson of the U.S. Business & Industrial Council
Educational Foundation.

Representing
more centrist positions are Steven Clemons of the New America Foundation,
former senator Gary Hart and Harvard international relations professor
Stephen Walt.

More left-wing
figures in the group include Charles Kupchan, an aide to former president
Bill Clinton now with the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) and Kenneth
Sharpe, a prominent foreign-policy analyst from Swarthmore College in
Philadelphia.

The launch
of the coalition, which intends to recruit other members, comes amid
growing concern in both the U.S. Congress and the public about the aftermath
of Washington's invasion of Iraq last March.

Congress
is currently debating the fate of an administration request for some
87 billion dollars over the next year for U.S. military operations and
reconstruction in Iraq. While the package is expected to be approved
with only minor modifications, it has provoked substantial unhappiness,
even from Bush's fellow Republicans, who worry that the occupation could
turn into a quagmire.

In addition,
the administration's proposed new anti-terrorist legislation has provoked
considerable opposition on Capitol Hill among lawmakers who claim that
it jeopardises many constitutional rights and gives too much power to
the state.

And while
public-approval ratings for Bush's foreign policy, which fell precipitously
through the summer, have stabilised, his support as measured by a series
of polls this month, continues to erode.

Thursday's
launch of the coalition was tied to the change in the national debate,
according to Kupchan, who noted that the public dialogue on Washington's
global role had been far too muted, if one-sided, since the 9/11 attacks.

"Now
there's been a shift in the country that has taken place," he said.
"The fact that we're all together here speaks volumes about the degree
to which our foreign policy is off course."

"We're
finally getting our act together," said Christopher Preble, a Cato
analyst who played a key role in convening the group.

The coalition
does not intend to recruit from the grassroots, where a number of existing
movements opposed the war on Iraq. It will instead focus on the recruitment
of foreign-policy specialists and analysts who can help frame the context
for public and media debate.

A major
target of the group will be the "neo-conservative" strategists in
and around the administration, especially those close to Vice President
Dick Cheney and Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who led the charge
into Iraq, continue to argue for military and other actions against
Syria, Iran, and North Korea, and promoted the larger strategic vision
of global U.S. military dominance.

The coalition's
purpose appears to be, above all, to publicly take on liberals and conservatives
who support the administration's imperial policies, beginning with its
'National Security Strategy.'

That document,
issued 13 months ago, calls for Washington to maintain its predominant
position in the world at all costs, even to the extent of waging pre-emptive
war against would-be rivals, and to reshape regions of the world in
ways that are compatible with U.S. interests and values.

"While
officials in the Bush administration publicly reject the terms 'empire'
and 'imperialism'," according to Preble, "empire fever appears to
have seized those on both the political left and the political right,"
he added, citing a recent assertion by prominent neo-conservative writer
Max Boot that "America's destiny is to police the world."

Despite
their various political and foreign-policy philosophies, all members
of the group accept the basic notion that the pursuit of U.S. military
domination will ultimately prove self-defeating.

"We can
expect, and are seeing now, multiple balances of power forming against
us. People resent and resist domination, no matter how benign," asserts
the charter, titled 'The Perils of Empire.'

"Empire
is problematic because it subverts the freedoms and liberties of citizens
at home, while simultaneously thwarting the will of people abroad,"
it notes. "An imperial strategy threatens to entangle America in an
assortment of unnecessary and unrewarding wars."

An imperial
strategy also "threatens to weaken us as a nation, overextending and
bleeding the economy and straining our military and federal budgets."

"We are
more isolated from the general opinions of mankind than at any time
in history," said McConnell, adding that he shares the concerns of
conservative icon Edmund Burke, who worried in the early 19th century
that Britain's very power at the time would result both in opposition
around the world and in taking on costs that it could not afford in
the long run.

Kupchan
said the administration's basic assumptions had already proven deeply
flawed. Among those, he said, were its belief that "the stronger America
is, the more uncompromising its leadership, the more likely the rest
of the world would follow along."

"The
United States today is far less safe than it was several years ago,
because we have weakened the international architecture which helped
protect us."

Jim
Lobe, works as Inter Press Service's
correspondent in the Washington, D.C., bureau. He has followed the ups
and downs of neo-conservatives since the well before their rise in the
aftermath of the September 11, 2001 attacks.